Stranded
by pwmo
Summary: When the Space Crusader Prometheus crashes on a planet in the Gamma Algirae System, temporarily reinstated Commanding Officer Frankenstein has to fight against the odds to survive in this unknown and wild, unforgiving environment. But when all hope seems lost, a fateful meeting will reshuffle the cards and, perhaps, make the prospect of surviving a little less out of reach.
1. Chapter 1

Inspired by "Sha Ka Ree" by ThereBeWhalesHere. (AO3)

Posting this actually terrifies me. I haven't written anything except essays and Uni-related stuff and I apparently forgot how to write fiction. Any grammatical/syntactical horror present is my fault, and my fault only. If you notice major mistakes do point them out to me, and I will proceed to fix everything the best I can.

Unbetaed, at least for now. 

* * *

**FREE FALL**

Interstellar Federation's headquarters, stardate: 2319.22.

Voices upon voices filled the control room talking in different languages at the same time, some sending instructions and other lending advice. Aside for a small hiccup on Titan ― a mercantile spaceship clashed with the native race due to a cultural misunderstanding ― that was quickly resolved, it had been a fairly uneventful day.

No wars on federate planets. No stars about to explode. The Academy was thriving with new life.

Then, something chimed; a sound so quiet it could have passed unnoticed, drowned out by the many voices reverberating in the room, had it not been so unexpected and peculiar.

«Commander Scanlan?» a voice emerged, calling for a black man in his fifties who was walking around the room, making sure everyone was doing their job. «Something's up in the Gamma Algirae System.»

The Gamma Algirae system was the largest open cluster in a radius of 2000 light years. Distant from most of the inhabited space, unremarkable in nature, and with no sentient species registered, it was a part of the universe the Federation wasn't too interested in.

Commander Scanlan marched up to the troubled officer and leveled the screen, eyes focused on the flashing dot.

«It's the probe orbiting around 𝜇-Bopp, sir.»

He squared his shoulders. The Federation had installed a probe in the star system (as per regulations) in stardate 2215, monitoring stellar activity and planets. Nothing except a dozen of magnetic storms and large meteors passing by was ever registered, remarking just how quiet and uninteresting that part of space was.

Until four months before, when the probe had transmitted a singular reading of unknown origin: the signal was too disturbed, and the transmission itself too distorted, to be deciphered and identified. It had been a one-time event, leading the base to believe that either the probe was malfunctioning or a stellar event messed with the system. But when it happened again two months later, they received proof that it was something more than an internal issue.

This was the third time. Three too many.

«Analyze it,» he grasped the backseat tight as the officer rushed to type commands. On the screen, the red dot flashed three times as a communication window opened.

The room, meanwhile, fell into an unnatural, expectant silence. Not a single person was paying mind to their own screens, heads turned toward Commander Scanlan and the mysterious flashing dot.

The officer shook his head. «The reading's corrupted, sir. The computer can't translate it.»

A nightmarish screech erupted from the speakers as he said so; a metallic wail like rusty gears rotating against each other, and scratched high-pitched noise that shrilled inside the ears of the people there. Everyone rushed to cover their ears, some also crouching down as trying to get away from the noise.

It lasted two minutes, then quiet fell over the room again. Commander Scanlan towered over the console, ears still reeling from the acoustic attack. Around him, thirty or so terrified officers looked at him expectantly with wide eyes.

«Officer Boyde,» he called out to a feminine-looking scaly humanoid, yellowish skin, and two sets of eyes widened in surprise.

They stood, clearly off-put by the transmission: «Commands, sir.»

«Contact the Academy and ask for Xenobiology Professor Frankenstein. Tell him I want his ass here as soon as possible.»

A murmur raised from the seats, but he paid it no mind and turned to a female Aldebaranian officer: «Have the _Prometheus _ready for exploration. We're sending our professor to do some field research.»

And Scanlan knew no one who wanted it more than Frankenstein.

Commander Scanlan looked terribly older than he remembered. Always severe and stern, his face was now decorated with a couple more scars and a bionic eye. He stood in front of the tunnel leading to the hangars, hands behind his back like a perfect soldier, and was staring at his closing-in figure.

«Greetings, Professor.» Frankenstein emerged from behind two armed Federation guards, adjusting the badge pinned to his uniform, and Scanlan extended his hand.

«Were the guards necessary for this?» Frankenstein asked him, reluctantly offering his own. Scanlan gestured him to follow but didn't worry to check, turning on his feet and walking inside the tunnel.

«I was just making sure you would show up. Thought about coming there myself, but I am a busy man.»

Frankenstein followed, maintaining a slower pace on purpose so he would not flank the Commander.

«Oh, wouldn't I know that.»

The _S.C. Prometheus _waited for him in the Interstellar Federation hangar, coming to life with a deep electric hum resonating through the metallic corridors and walls.

Scanlan stopped. Two officers showed up from a side door with clothes in their hands: a Federation spacesuit complete of boots, gloves, and the official badge. He was meant to change into Federation clothes, pilot a Federation spaceship, help in a Federation mission.

Almost ironic, almost funny; Frankenstein didn't laugh. He collected the clothes and walked up to a private booth to change, and Scanlan followed.

«You don't have to keep such a close eye on me, Commander,» he sing-sang from behind a metal door. «It's not like I have more thrilling projects in my hands at the moment.»

«Can't be too sure with you, _Professor _.» Scanlan put emphasis on the last word with intention. As if he needed a reminder of who he was now.

Once changed, Frankenstein was led to the boarding dock of the starship. He walked in silence up to the control room, alone, sitting on the chair in a way that would not crease its fabric. His back curved against the seat, arms laying on the full length of the armrests, he allowed a breath to escape his lips and his eyes to close. Opening them again, his own face reflected on the windshield was staring back; beyond that, the endless vastity of darkness and stars, light years away. Something he'd been familiar with for so long and from which he was torn off, now once again within his reach.

His hand naturally curled around the controller, some sort of exhilaration building up in his chest from knowing how far he could go with only one small push.

_«Everything is set,» _the voice of an officer chimed in his earpiece as the screen flooded with pictures and diagrams his eager eyes devoured, hungry for action. _«The specifics of your mission are available on both your tricord and the ship's database.»_

«When was the last time you piloted one of these?» Scanlan interjected.

The grip of his hand around the control lever tightened for a moment, then relaxed. «I don't remember, when did you revoke my pilot status?»

The officer's voice returned and he leaned back, preparing for the takeoff. «_ Are you ready, sir? _»

«Ready as I'll ever be,» he grinned, already savoring the sight of darkness around himself.

The _Prometheus _hummed again, lower this time, as the hangar opened overhead and the thrusters activated. Commander Scanlan said not a word more, and Frankenstein was grateful.

«_ Three– _»

He adjusted the suit and changed its color from standard red and grey to black, eyes barely pausing on the helmet provided by the IDC as part of the uniform and making no move to reach for it.

«_ Two _―»

The ship vibrated as the thrusters reached full-power. Inhale, exhale. Inhale, exhale. Blood thumped in his ears like ritual drums.

«_ One _―»

The power was released. One second later, he was surrounded by distant lights, the green orb that is Mab growing farther by the second until it was lost behind him among countless other bright dots.

Inhale, exhale.

He leaned toward the console, excitement bright in his eyes.

«Initialize warp sequence level 2. Access code: HF-9011. Coordinates to 𝜇-Bopp, Gamma Algirae System.»

The computer signaled the operation with a high-pitched _beep_, adjusting speed and thrusters' power for the warp; a second later, the portion of universe visible through the windshield seemed to twist into a tunnel.

Frankenstein hadn't piloted a ship in five years, six months and twenty-one days; he hadn't seen one either in that span of time, except the ones occasionally flying above cities, all because of the Interstellar Federation. The same Federation who asked him to pilot their newest ship to a probe 1760 light years away to extract data on-site and search for the transmission's origin point.

He thought of refusing. When Scanlan called, Frankenstein thought of laughing in his face and tell the Federation to shove it. But the truth, which infinitely irked him, was that he could not decline the offer. The Federation deprived him of the universe and was willing to give it back, although for a short amount of time. His body craved zero gravity, craved the glimmering stars and the iridescent nebulas, felt their call day and night like Earthian wolves used to hear the Moon's.

Frankenstein spotted the probe orbiting around the red dwarf, seemingly unscathed as far as it concerned the external components. He followed the safety procedures to the letter, scanning surrounding stars for possible stellar events and radiations; only when the word "SAFE" flashed on the screen he turned the scanner toward the probe.

Not only the hardware, but also the network and digital system were copacetic. Puzzling. «Computer, send a standard request for generalities to the probe. Let's get a sample transmission and see what's up,» he huffed the command in hope to catch anomalies in new transmissions, receiving nothing but perfect readings instead.

All that was left to do before resorting to extravehicular activity was manual on-board data extraction. One long extendible cable emerged from the hull of the ship; he guided it like a hard-mode version of a crane machine until it physically connected to the probe, and he started the extraction.

The process didn't usually take long to finish and this was an outdated system easy to access, but the wait had him itch all over and soon became unbearable. Stillness was never something he could achieve, and his need to constantly be challenged is what made him an excellent pilot, an unsatisfied teacher, and a terrible full-time lover.

He watched with a certain amount of impatience as Terabytes of information transferred into the _Prometheus _' database, his right leg almost numb from all the bouncing up and down, and occasionally glance to the screen where extravehicular conditions were monitored to check for sudden changes in atmospheric readings.

«_ DATA EXTRACTION COMPLETE. _»

«Select reading .»

It was a 3 minutes transmission of what the computer described as the result of a geomagnetic storm originating from a star much more active than 𝜇-Bopp. The probe was outdated, but geomagnetic storms hadn't been an issue since the Mars colony invented the magnetic shields, back into stardate 2127. One couldn't possibly cause that much damage.

He listened to the transmission. Nothing of interest appeared until 01:20, when a faint static noise often overlapped with the signal; it grew louder, and from 02:18 onwards the original signal was completely unintelligible and undecipherable due to a scratching sound resembling the scraping of metal on metal.

All at once the gravity of the ship gave out, lifting Frankenstein up and then slamming him violently against the seat. Countless asteroids big like human heads flew past and against the ship. As he struggled to get to his feet, he saw the main thruster hover behind the windshield, attracted by the red dwarf.

Next, the ship was falling. Frankenstein reached to send a distress signal, only to be bounced against a wall by another collision. Metal bent and snapped overhead, windshield cracked in a spider web pattern and small stones stuck into the glass, as he staggered to his feet and moved toward the helmet. The digital system was dead. No scans, no warps, no shields or communication systems ― nothing worked except the piercing shrill of the alarm and the manual steering mechanism. He moved to reach for the helmet only to change his mind at the last second and turn to the controls, ship tearing through the planet's atmosphere like a meteor.

A sickening screech of metal exploded behind his back, but Frankenstein was too focused on steering the ship and attempt an emergency landing to notice. He couldn't, however, ignore the sudden blast of wind entering the cockpit and how it whipped against his body. He gritted his teeth and grasped the lever tighter, fingernails piercing through the flesh of his own hands, blood dripping upwards as the vacuum sucked it outside.

Frankenstein calculated the distance from the ground and how long it would take for the ship to crash.

10.000 meters.

How many breaths he could take before the air got knocked out of his lungs forever.

5.000 meters

He pulled the steering lever harder and cursed, feeling the Prometheus to quake all around him.

2.000 meters.

He braced himself for the collision with the ground when a searing pain sized his right side and a sudden stream of warm liquid soaked the spacesuit.

1.000 meters.

"_Fuck you, Federation,_" was the last conscious thought he mustered before everything went black, as the windshield exploded into a million fragments.

* * *

I based most technical terms and space stuff (like the Federation) on Star Trek because it has extensive lore and terminology already developed. I do not intend to create a massive Sci-Fi universe, so I took the easy road with that - hopefully, this won't be the thing that makes you quit.

More tags will be added as the story proceeds, and the rating may change - a content warning will be placed at the start of the chapter if the need arises.

Thank you!


	2. Chapter 2

**CONTENT WARNING:** several mentions of blood and gore, dizziness, loss of consciousness, ruptured eardrums, profanities.

* * *

There's a Class M planet orbiting around the red dwarf ?-Bopp. It has been there undisturbed for 3 billion years, never having known of human life or mankind's successes. It ignores the wars destroying Alpha Lyra, the Ice Age on Puck that reinvigorated the local economy, the death of phi Cygnus 5000 light years away.

We pan in into the planet's surface and encounter a purplish sky. Large, heavy yellow clouds crackle with electricity, the pungent scent of burnt ozone forewarning an incoming storm.

Through the clouds we descend closer to the ground, panning in, and we now see how the surface of this unremarkable planet looks: green and blue occupy most of it, vivid and lush under ?-Bopp's light. There are small areas of naked ground where gorges and canyon carved their way into the stone; others look barren, deserted, the earth of a red vivid like fire. Mountain ranges jutting out into the sky with their often bare, often snow-covered sharp peaks, fangs of a beast whose wide-open jaws prepare to shut in a lethal bite.

We pan in, into an endless stretch of vibrant green enclosed by a thick forest. There's a long gash in the ground, scarring the prairie: it looks fresh, recent, as the earth brought to light still hasn't dried.

All around the gash, particles of something alien reflect the light like small mirrors; we pan in, and it's metal scattered all around the prairie — debris of something that impacted with the ground and caused the long scar which we follow to its end, where what remains of the cockpit of a spaceship lays damaged and dirty.

We pan in, past the layers of metal and the name _S.C. Prometheus _printed on the side of the spaceship, past the crackling electric cables and the smoke, into the wreckage that once was the control room, and see an unmoving figure amidst the chaos. We see long blond hair spilled on a torn black spacesuit where the logo of the IF is embedded in gold lettering; we see him resting against the console, arms limp to his side.

He opens his eyes.

Shapes of light danced before his eyes like a weird kaleidoscope. Pain ripped him from unconsciousness with violence, knocking the air out of his lungs before he could draw a breath; he felt panic coming in waves but forced it into remission as clarity also returned.

There was no time to freak out, nor would have been wise. The situation was dire enough, panicking would only make it worse in more than one way.

He was wounded, and wounds didn't work well with panic. Frankenstein could feel his right side pulsing painfully, his spacesuit damp of something warm and metallic in smell, and an unusual weight on the same spot.

Above him, a sliver of sky was visible through a hole in the cockpit: it was nothing close to the blue the Federation spent so long recreating on Mab. Lilac fading into a deeper lavender color on the horizon, the red dwarf high in the sky. He could not tell what part of the day it was.

Three facts he ascertained while laying on the _Prometheus' _floor. One, the atmosphere of this godforsaken planet was Earth-like. Two, he was stranded with an irreparable ship, and no one at the Federation knew what happened. Three, the motherfucking control lever was embedded in his flesh like the Sword in the Stone.

A groan escaped Frankenstein as he moved to a sitting position, but muffled, as if drowned by cotton. Given the crash and the rapid descent through the planet's atmosphere, the possibility that his eardrums were ruptured was real and scary. Infections in his current predicament meant certain death: Frankenstein was vaccinated against all known diseases when he joined the Federation, but who knows what kind of pathogens resided on this planet?

No, no. Lingering on dark thoughts wasn't going to do any good. He focused on his medical training instead.

One good thing that came with being stabbed by his own ship was that the lever acted like a dam, keeping him from dying from blood loss. The ship was also equipped with an infirmary kit; unless it had been shattered, he only needed to stand up and search around.

Frankenstein smiled at himself and all the odds against him. He could do it.

Actually "doing it" took a lot out of him and gave nothing back except a rising sense of hopelessness and futility.

Standing hadn't been, surprisingly, too much of a problem. Dizzy from the pain and the disorientation, Frankenstein stumbled a couple of times before steadying himself against what remained of the control console. His whole body was numb and it was difficult to feel when the limbs were moving accordingly to his instructions, but in the span of two hours he managed to venture outside and search through the scraps.

Not much was left of the _Prometheus _, who soared the stars once in its life and never would again: half of the cockpit with an irrelevant amount of residual energy and with the windshield completely shattered, his chair burnt to crisps a couple of meters back, various unrecognizable metal scraps here and there. Nothing useful, nothing safe and no infirmary kit whatsoever. Not even in the surroundings of the wreckage or among the debris, where he thoroughly searched despite the wound sending waves of unbearable pain through his body.

Now, Frankenstein was back to the damaged cockpit and considering his choices: he could remove the lever and let himself die of blood loss, or he could get creative and find another way to cauterize the wound.

He opted for the latter, because Frankenstein was many things but "quitter" wasn't in the list. The Federation once praised his drive to survive in the face of hardships, the way he always managed to fight back even when all hope seemed lost; it was time to show them things hadn't changed.

Frankenstein wrapped a hand around the control lever emerging from his body and inhaled before ripping it out with a scream that made his jaw ache. Seized with burning pain he reached for two cables dangling from the main console; they sparked and warmed under his sweaty palm when he stroked them together, and with his eyes closed Frankenstein pressed both to the wound.

He'd felt pain in his life. An Andorsan shot him in the leg with a fragmenting bullet during a mission, smashing his kneecap to dust and almost doing the same to the rest of the bones, but it wasn't even comparable to the pain he felt as his skin sizzled and burned. And the smell — he would have retched if his stomach hadn't been empty.

But when he threw the cables away, the last sparks of electricity throbbing through the ship dissipated into his own body, he was alive. Tears copiously poured on his face, his jaw hurting from all the tension and the clenching and the screams, but he was alive.

Frankenstein's body slumped almost boneless to the floor; he didn't fight it. Consciousness flickered as a response to the excessive physical stress, then faded away like a shadow through the mist.

He could rest a little bit now. He earned that right.

Rustling of leaves; something glided through the foliage and the thick vegetation, a cloak of shadow hiding it from sight. It stared at the crash site from afar, always moving through the forest, eyes scanning the open field and the smoke rising. Nothing moved.

It pushed closer but never abandoning its sheltered hideout, peeking through the leaves and branches, then retreating only to move a bit closer, always closer, cautious.

Movement stopped the figure before it could leave the forest: a shadow before, and then a tall humanoid figure exited from the largest cluster of shining metal staggering on their feet and looking around with a purpose.

The thing in the woods followed with the lightest possible steps as the humanoid figure explored the site and, seemingly disappointed, staggered back to where they came from.

The impossible silence was torn by a scream of unspeakable pain that lasted but a couple of seconds, though it would take a while for the echo to stop ringing.

The figure didn't move towards the crash, waiting for silence to fall and cover the surroundings before making its move and finally pushing through the vegetation, glancing around to check for any other living creature.

It approached the large cluster of metal the humanoid figure retreated to, hesitating on its threshold and focusing on small sounds; but aside from a soft, regular breathing noise that would have been impossible to pick up were it not so silent all around, the figure heard nothing and stepped inside.

Before crashing on the planet's surface, all the metal scattered around belonged to a spaceship whose name was printed in large, slate-grey lettering on the front of the main console: _S.C. Prometheus. _The figure didn't know its origin, but it sparked a sense of nostalgic familiarity that was quickly brushed away. There was no time for reminiscences, someone was _there _.

A human. The figure tentatively crouched by their side, eyes sweeping the body and taking in as many details as possible: two eyes now closed, one nose, one mouth, two arms and legs respectively ending in hands and feet. The figure couldn't see their feet, but the hands had five fingers each so assumed it would be the same for the lower limbs. They appeared to be sleeping heavily as they did not react to the figure's presence; a large gash in the fabric of their spacesuit exposed a similarly large expanse of skin where blisters surrounded a blackened, bloodied wound.

The figure gently poked the human on his good side: no reaction except an unintelligible mumble. Tried again, same result. It took part of its robes off his body and laid it on the floor next to the human, then slowly pulled the body over the fabric and started dragging it away from the crash site toward the woods.

He slipped in and out of consciousness so many times, Frankenstein lost count after the third. It was almost pitch black, save for a vivid red hue low on his line of sight.

Frankenstein felt pain. His right side throbbed, he was parched and cotton-mouthed, and could not seem to focus on something before dizziness took over and forced him to squeeze his eyes close.

He remembered feeling cold where the wound once was. Something strongly smelled of herbs he couldn't recognize but vaguely resembled the scent of lavender and sage, and it soothed the burnt skin.

Another time, Frankenstein woke up with something equally cold on his forehead and a fruity aftertaste in his mouth. His mind latched onto the thought and suddenly he was back to his early years on Mab, his mother cooking a raspberry cake for his birthday because it was his favorite. A strange shiver seized his body, followed by something extremely soft being placed over him before the memory was lost and he succumbed to darkness again.

He saw a figure in one of his fever dreams, a human-shaped blur crouched by his side in his unfocused vision that felt tangible, present. Real.

He was too tired to question whether it actually was or not.


End file.
